Selected quad for the lemma: kingdom_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A63917
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A sermon preached at Epsom upon the 9th of September, being the day of thanksgiving appointed by His Majesty for the discovery and disappointment of the Republican Plot, and now made publick to obviate false reports by John Turner ...
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Turner, John, b. 1649 or 50.
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1683
(1683)
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Wing T3317; ESTC R38379
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29,169
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46
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be founded in the Peace and Quiet of the World and in the Interest and Happiness of Humane Life and therefore when he tells us that he is the Minister of God to us for Good we must allow him in the Exercise of his Government to judge for himself what that Good and Evil is otherwise he will unavoidably bear the Sword in vain and we shall never be punisht but when we please our selves So also St. Peter argues in the words that have been already produced submit your selves to every Ordinance of Man for the Lords sake whether it be to the King as Supream or unto Governours as unto them that are sent by him for the punishmenâ— of evil doers and for the praise of them that do well but now if we be allowed in all Cases to determine for our selves when we do well or ill so as they shall have no power to punish or reward but with our own consent then it is we that are the Kings and the Governours and not they Thirdly The Doctrine of Non resistance is still further inferred and prest upon us by considering the Example of our Saviour and those Miraculous Powers for the Discipline of the Church which were given to the Apostles and first Preachers of the Gospel As for our Saviour though he could at any time have destroyed his Enemies by a word of his Mouth or a motion of his Finger or by the least act or intention of his Will and though he could have called down so many Legions of destroying Angels to his assistance yet he chose rather to be an Example of Meekness and Humility of Patience and Obedience to the Powers he lived under than of Resistance against them And for the Apostles and their Successors it is well known that St. Peter with the Sentence of Excommunication denounced against them struck Ananias and Sapphira dead and St. Paul threatned with the like or some such usage Hymeneus and Alexander and the incestuous Corinthian and others and it is commonly supposed by Learned Men that this Power remained in the Church of inflicting Death and Diseases after a Miraculous way till the Empire took Christianity into its Protection and then the Secular Sword was sufficient to back the Ecclesiastical Censures but now they never had a Power of inflicting the like Plagues or Calamities upon any that were not of their own Body which was as much as to say that God expected that they should practise the Doctrine of passive Obedience or Non-resistance with respect to their Superiours though they had a Power of Discipline among themselves Fourthly and laâ—â—â—â— God himself did ordain and constitute an Arbitrary â—overnment when he appointed first Judges and then Kings of Israel that were invested with it as appears from this that there is no where any mention made of any Senate or any number of Men that had a Power of limiting and controuling them from the strange Enormities of the Sons of Eli from whence notwithstanding no Rebellion followed from David's killing the Amalekite without any Legal Process as Solomon was about to serve the Child that he was going to divide and from the Deaths of Joab and Shimei who were both of them put to death with no other Process or Formality than the Kings Command and lastly from the Answer of Rehoboham to the Children of Israel before the Division of the two Kingdoms The Fathers of Families who were the first Kings had an unaccountable Power of Life and Death over their Children and Slaves all over the East and also by the Old Roman Law and I do not speak this as if I had any fancy to be a Slave but this was mostly the Government in the East and so it continues to be to this Day and God by appointing it in some Cases hath shewn undeniably that it is more sutable to the Will of God and to the Happiness of Men that a Government should be Arbitrary than that every Man should do that which is right in his own Eyes as it was with the Israelites after the Death of Samson when the Scripture tells us there was no King in Israel for a King and a Judge were in Authority the same only the one was Hereditary and the other was not And now to apply all this to a Popish Successor or onâ— that is reputed a Papist which the disturbers of oâ—r Peace pretend so much to fear it is true that the Laws of the Land are against Popery but yet it is every whit as true that the Laws of Nature and the Practice of Christianity in all Ages are against a Rebellion and the Laws of the Land cannot warrant us to do that which the Laws of Nature forbid it is true likewise that we live in a tempered Monarchy and that the People though they have not the executive Power nor any share in the Administration yet they have a right of consenting to those Laws by which they ought in Justice to be governed but if the King will exceed his-bounds a Civil War is as dangerous and destructive in one sort of Government as another and consequently Resistance is in all Governments equally unlawful I shall conclude with bogging your Pardon for the length of this Discourse and with desiring you since I have not time to reflect within your selves upon the detestable blackness of the Crime of which the Kings Enemies and yours are Guilty upon the Horrid Consequences that would have attended the success of it and to adore that Providence that hath Delivered you from it and pay your thanks to God by Obedience to the King Obedience in your Thoughts Obedience in your Actions Obedience in your Principles and always to be mindful of the advice of Solomon Curse not the King no not in thy thought for a Bird of the Air shall carry the Voice and that which hath Wings shall tell the Matter FINIS